August 27, 2014

Reading

The Second Letter of Saint Paul to the Thessalonians   3: 6-10, 16-18

3:6	But we strongly caution you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to draw yourselves away from every brother who is walking in disorder and not according to the tradition that they received from us.
3:7	For you yourselves know the manner in which you ought to imitate us. For we were not disorderly among you.
3:8	Nor did we eat bread from anyone for free, but rather, we worked night and day, in hardship and weariness, so as not to be burdensome to you.
3:9	It was not as if we had no authority, but this was so that we might present ourselves as an example to you, in order to imitate us.
3:10	Then, too, while we were with you, we insisted on this to you: that if anyone was not willing to work, neither should he eat.
3:16	Then may the Lord of peace himself give you an everlasting peace, in every place. May the Lord be with all of you.
3:17	The greeting of Paul with my own hand, which is the seal in every epistle. So do I write.
3:18	May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.

Gospel

Matthew 26: 32

23:27 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed sepulchers, which outwardly appear brilliant to men, yet truly, inside, they are filled with the bones of the dead and with all filth.

23:28 So also, you certainly appear to men outwardly to be just. But inwardly you are filled with hypocrisy and iniquity.

23:29 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites, who build the sepulchers of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the just.

23:30 And then you say, ‘If we had been there in the days of our fathers, we would not have joined with them in the blood of the prophets.’

23:31 And so you are witnesses against yourselves, that you are the sons of those who killed the prophets.

23:32 Complete, then, the measure of your fathers.

23:33 You serpents, you brood of vipers! How will you escape from the judgment of Hell?